Luca Romano had never believed there were places he did not know.
Cities were bodies. Streets were veins. Tunnels were bones.
And Luca—Luca was the predator that had shed blood on every inch of it.
He stood alone in the dark operations room as the video played again.
Elena’s face filled the screen.
Bruised. Broken. Crying.
For a moment—just a moment—his composure cracked.
Then he exhaled slowly and said, almost to himself, “Play it again.”
The technicians hesitated.
“Again,” Luca repeated.
The sound returned.
Not the words.
The space between them.
The echo.
The silence.
Luca leaned forward, elbows resting on the table, eyes narrowing—not in pain, but calculation.
Lamine Alvarez had made one mistake.
He had spoken.
“Pause,” Luca said.
The image froze.
He didn’t look at E
